India and the Crisis in Ukraine.
Every day we are waking up to the horrors of war in Ukraine — death of innocents, houses being bombed, stories of displaced refugees and the overall futility of the whole exercise. One silver lining amidst all this has been the unity of international community in condemning Russian aggression and defending Ukrainian sovereignty.
While the unity of the international community especially European countries, has been heartening, as an Indian I was disappointed by India’s reluctance to vote against Russia as the UN voted to condemn the aggressor.
With a lot of false news spreading through social media, I thought of giving a deeper look into the issue to understand the nuances. Here are some of my thoughts.
Indo — Russian relationship : Though India was one of the founding members of NAM [Non-Aligned movement] and stood against polarization of the world. Pragmatic geo-political scenarios made India move towards a post-Stalin USSR. Be it the neutrality Russia maintained during Indo-Sino conflicts or the open support during Indo-Pak war of 1971, the friendship has been a long-lasting and trusted one.
With a bilateral trade target of US$30 billion to be reached by 2025, this strategic, military, economic and diplomatic relationship only seems to be getting tighter.
Indo — Ukraine relationship: In contrary to the social media misinformation posts, India-Ukraine relationship has not been the worst.
A couple of viral misinformation to be addressed
a) In 1998 Ukraine opposed India’s nuclear test and voted in favor of UN Resolution 1172 condemning India’s nuclear test — However, Ukraine was not a member of the security council [permanent OR non-permanent] which was qualified to vote on this resolution. So this is highly unlikely.
b) Ukraine wanted UN involvement in Kashmir Issue — Ukraine’s public posture has been to support the resolution of Kashmir issue on the basis of Simla agreement.
While it is true that Ukraine and Pakistan have an extensive arms trade with Pakistan being one of their the top arms buyers, we need to note that India too has lucrative defense deals with Ukraine. There are almost 400 contracts between India and Ukraine.
Coming to the What-ifs. What-if India voted against Russia?
Abandoning a trusted 70-year-old friendship might cost India dearly. Some of the repercussions may be.
Lack of Russian support during conflicts. India’s relationship with it’s neighbors like China and Pakistan has been fraught with instability and it has witnessed frequent clashes. The stand of western partner’s during a future conflict is unpredictable, even an explicit promise by the west cannot be trusted [remember the Afghan/Syrian allies of the west who were abandoned].
Economic Impact. Indian imports from Russia were $6.9 billion in 2021, mainly mineral oils, fertilizers and rough diamonds. Exports totaled to $3.3 billion. Finding a new trade partner to fill the void will be next to impossible. Add to it India is solely dependent on imports for fertilizers. The Indian farming industry which has had its own issues in the past few years, will be under the gun.
Impact on the Defense sector. The fact that the share of Russian-origin weapons and platforms across Indian armed forces is as high as 85% should give some perspective. While India has recently made deals with US and France in attempts to diversify, the Russian hardware is not going out soon.
In addition to the above, India has around 17K students in Russia and 18K in Ukraine.
Considering all of these, the Indian government’s tight rope walk of maintaining neutrality looks like the best option. Abstaining from the voting, similar to its neighbors, is the lesser evil choice here.
As of today, India has sent it’s first tranche of relief materials to Ukraine. Along with this, India should also consider taking in refugees of this war and providing other humanitarian assistance.
